1. Field of the Invention
The preset invention relates to a sensor for detecting particles through a MEMS technology, a method for manufacturing such a sensor, and a method for detecting particles using a particle detection sensor.
2. Description of the Related Art
Research on micromechanical systems called MEMS has been actively advanced. MEMS (Micro Electro Mechanical System) is an abbreviation of a microelectromechanical system, and also simply called a micromachine. A micromachine means a microdevice formed by integrating a “movable microstructure with a three-dimensional structures” using a semiconductor micromachining technique. A microstructure may function as a switch, a variable capacitor, an actuator, or the like. Such a micromachine is formed from a silicon wafer, and is used as an inertial force sensor (Reference 1: Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2003-329704).
As an example of a sensor used at present, a pollen sensor can be given. The number of hay fever sufferers continues to increase, and hay fever (pollinosis) assumes a national disease. If exposure to pollen can be reduced, it is considered that development of pollinosis can be reduced. In order to reduce exposure to pollen, it is effective to grasp the amount of pollen dispersed and avoid area where much pollen is dispersed. As a method of grasping the amount of dispersed pollen, a system for collecting pollen information by measuring the amount of pollen dispersed in the air is proposed (Reference 2: Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2002-157511).
As a pollen sensor, a structure including a light source which emits excitation light and a detector which detects luminescence emitted by pollen exposed to the excitation light is proposed (Reference 3: Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 7-83830).